


pull me closer

by reddoorandlemontree



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Jonerys Secret Santa 2019, i know it's not christmas anymore but i tried :/, merry crisis!, second chance romance!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:15:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22039180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddoorandlemontree/pseuds/reddoorandlemontree
Summary: Dany has to do a double-take to make sure it’s really him and even then, she’s not entirely convinced that he’s real.Seeing Jon Snow push through the revolving door in her building’s lobby, it’s like she’s 17 again, watching him saunter into their Health class, consistently way past the bell.
Relationships: Jon Snow/Daenerys Targaryen
Comments: 74
Kudos: 327





	pull me closer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [atetheredmind](https://archiveofourown.org/users/atetheredmind/gifts).



> this is for atetheredmind (muttpeeta on tumblr!). i'm sorry for this being very very very late life kind of gave me a big ol' fuck you but i tried to get it out as quickly at possible!
> 
> merry late christmas y'all!!
> 
> (disclaimer: i know very very little about corporate structure and business oops)

Dany has to do a double-take to make sure it’s really him and even then, she’s not entirely convinced that he’s real.

Seeing Jon Snow push through the revolving door in her building’s lobby, it’s like she’s 17 again, watching him saunter into their Health class, consistently way past the bell.

He’s clad in a dapper suit and tie instead of a hand-me-down sweatshirt and jeans that are too tight. His barely-connecting beard is now full but neatly trimmed, framing the same pouty lips. His curls are pulled back into a bun, making her grieve the wild tousled look he’d donned in high school but simultaneously taking her breath away. And when his eyes immediately catch hers across the immense lobby, there is a crushing blankness, as if he doesn’t even know her, where there had once been unfathomably deep love and laughter.

She had known he would hate her and yet seeing that disdain — so deep that he feels the need to hide it behind a mask of indifference — has her reeling.

Her heels clack against the marble floor as she stumbles backwards into a waiting elevator and jabs at the door-close button, needing reprieve from his heavy stare as it shrouds her until the steel doors slide shut between them.

She isn’t 17 anymore. She’s 29 and successful and powerful and seeing an ex-boyfriend should not be affecting her as much as it is.

Still, the entire ride up, she can’t help but hope that he’s some associate from another company, only here for a meeting. Some highly necessary snooping, however, reveals otherwise.

What in the world possessed him to work at a company founded by his high school girlfriend, she will never understand but apparently, he’s been a part of it for three years now, just recently moved from the Boston branch to their headquarters in New York. He’d started out as part of the accounting staff but had quickly worked his way up to Chief Business Development Officer, a greatly respected position just under the CFO.

Walking back to her office, she tries to maintain passivity against the surge of pride that overwhelms her at the news. Of _course_ he’s climbing up the ladder so quickly — it’s _Jon_ , the same one who tried out for their school's football team for a chance at some scholarship and ended up being named captain just months later. He’s a leader at heart.

As silly as it sounds, it equally saddens and comforts her to know that it’s still _him_ , that even after twelve years of silence between them, she still recognizes parts of the boy she fell in love with in the man he has become since.

“And may I ask what you’re so glum about?”

Missandei’s voice causes her to jerk her head up from the blank desktop screen she’d been distractedly staring at.

“What?” she asks, somewhat embarrassed. “Is it so extraordinary for a person to not be smiling this early in the morning?”

“No, but you’re one of those weirdos that loves Mondays so for _you_ , yes,” she laughs, setting her daily Americano down on a coaster.

Dany accepts the cup with a grateful hum, hoping Missandei forgets that she never answered but a glance up reveals eagerly waiting chocolate eyes. By now, she knows better than to be surprised by how in-tune Missandei is with her for she’s more of a best friend than an assistant.

“You know how Jorah’s retiring soon?”

“Yes, thank _fuck_. I always thought he was such a creep.”

“Well, the replacement he’s training right now… he and I happen to know one another.”

Something about the uncharacteristically vague answer and the way she can’t stop wringing her hands now must speak volumes because Missandei’s only response is a kind smile and “Lunch?”

“Lunch.”

~

Despite having been in the same district for twelve years, they hadn’t really met until the second marking period of senior year.

Her only absence in all of high school landed on the day their Health teacher assigned the classic fake baby project, partnering her with the only other absentee that day: some jock by the name of Jon Snow.

Three weeks of co-parenting their baby boy, a literal paper bag of all-purpose flour, gave way to a fast friendship and then something more, all stemming from stupid jokes and petty disagreements and undeniable teen impulsiveness.

It wasn’t the longest or easiest of relationships but he made her happier than she’d ever been and she loved him for that and so much more.

Nonetheless, there’s an unacknowledged but evidenced pattern for high school couples that decide to continue their relationship into college: in late fall, the distance will become too much and the prospective hook-ups too tempting, pushing the sweethearts towards _a break_ — a euphemism for what will most likely be a break- _up_.

Jon and Dany were extremely proud of themselves for making it through to winter, thinking the worst of the longing had been weathered. But the heartache, the kind that made her weepy and weak, didn’t set in until December.

They spent their nightly Skype sessions making plans for break, a dangerous thing to do for someone whose life was as tumultuous as hers, but she couldn’t help it. The promise of him and all they would do once she flew home for Christmas was the only thing that anchored her.

As December rolled around, however, her hopes fell to pieces with one curt phone call from her father. He all but forced her into registering for two winter quarter classes, his voice stern and flat as he said, “ _We are Targaryens, Daenerys; do you understand what that means? We do not fall behind the group, we supersede them. Your brothers took extra courses to graduate early and so will you. This is not up for discussion._ ” Her mind was numb to everything as she complied but the reminder of Jon and all their carefully laid plans slowly tore her heart in two.

All they’d ever really fought about was her father — Jon wanted to smash the man’s face in with a baseball bat while Dany lived to please him, only because she knew the consequences of deviating from anything but perfect.

The prospect of dashing his hopes and seeing his face fall in disappointment as to the reason why pained her so much that she pushed off telling him until the 23rd of December, responding to his “ _have a safe flight and call when you land_ ” text with a Skype call.

The real conversation proved to be unimaginably worse.

“ _Oh_.” That was all he had to say when she broke the news to him.

It was punctuated by a tense silence that had her wanting to book the soonest flight from SAF to EWR. All she could really offer him, however, was a pathetic, whimpered, “I’m sorry, Jon.”

But then she saw him transform, his pixelated features shifting on her screen to instead convey understanding and assurance as he said, “It’s fine, Dany, I get it. I know how your dad can be. Don’t worry about it. Really.”

His words are meant to be comforting but the effect they have is akin to a punch in the gut. How often had he done this and she’d failed to recognize the hollowness in his tone? How fucking selfish was she to cling to him knowing that he spent every second compromising for her inescapable circumstances? Protecting her from the guilt that came with never being able to put him first?

“I think we should take a break, Jon.”

The words tumbled from her lips and she heard them as if it were a stranger speaking through her.

He fought her on it, of course, but she knew he was too good to consider what was best for him and so she gritted her teeth and pushed through, hoping it would make him _see_.

It’s Dany who ultimately ended the call. She switched her phone off as soon as it was over and resigned herself to just staring at the sad, little, plastic Christmas tree she and her roommate had put up on her desk. Its colorful lights turned to fuzzy bokeh as tears pool in her eyes and she’s not quite sure how long she sat there, only that she never wanted to see another fucking Christmas tree ever again.

The regret hit her like a freight train as soon as the melancholic haze wore off hours later.

An increasingly panicked mantra of _no, no, no_ filled her ears as she scrambled to turn on her phone and swallow all the words she’d carelessly spat at him. They could’ve worked past it like they always have! They were _Jon and Dany_ — they were fucking _invincible_! How had she let one obstacle tear everything down?

But when her phone came back to life and said there were 4 missed calls and 17 messages from him, her finger only hovered above the _slide to unlock_ switch.

Maybe it was a stupid decision, an awful overreaction to something she could have tried to mend… but Jon, _her_ Jon… he didn’t deserve anyone who would even _consider_ such a thought, let alone go through with it.

~

When she retells a much briefer and less sob-story-esque version of it all to Missandei over their lunch block, her friend gives her a peculiar look that she knows all too well.

“Missandei, do _not_.”

“Wha— I didn’t even say anything!”

“But you’re thinking it!”

“Of course I’m thinking it, Dany!” she says with a laugh like it’s the most obvious conclusion to come upon. “You dated for a year, were as madly in love as 17-year-olds can be, then broke up over something that I personally believe could have been talked out —” she shoots Dany a pointed look, “— and now, twelve years later, this man just _happens_ to be working at the company you run. He _clearly_ wants to end that ‘break’!”

She can’t help but scoff, betting it to be the safest response. “If so, it’s a pretty stupid way of showing it. And besides, you’re making way too many assumptions. My name isn’t plastered onto every office building we own, you know, he probably just applied for the sake of the job without knowing I would be his CEO. He could be a married father of three, for all we know,” she adds with a light chuckle but even the thought makes it feel like her pasta might make a reappearance. He’d used to joke that, since their flour baby had been named Harry (the name scribbled on his belly in Mr. Sketch marker by their Health teacher), they were ethically obliged to make him two siblings named Ron and Hermione to complete the trio. She, who had _actually_ read the books, would always explain how weird that would be considering that, in the seventh book, Ron and—

Missandei’s knowing cackle interrupts her train of thought and all Dany can do is groan and roll her eyes.

“Nothing is ever going to happen between us again. Believe me.”

~

Perhaps she should have spent more time convincing herself of that rather than Missandei because once just the _idea_ of the idea is planted into her mind, she finds it impossible to shake.

Her office is on the sixth floor and his is on the third but Daenerys Targaryen is nothing if not driven.

She begins altering her routine in the slightest ways and tells herself it’s for reasons that definitely do not include Jon.

She works from home less often. Her visits to the third floor become more frequent as she goes to Tyrion, her CFO, for questions that could have easily been addressed over a quick exchange of emails. She loves a good pantsuit, hence why they make up the bulk of her wardrobe, so she tries her best to ignore Missandei’s raised eyebrow the day she opts for a well-fitted pencil skirt instead.

It’s all an exercise in futility, however.

They exchange plenty of emails, for they do have a job to do, after all, but they are never anything but strictly formal. That is to be expected of all employees, though, so she pays it no mind even if it feels odd.

The truly glaring disparity is that the kind smile she gives him in their rare encounters is always met with a tight one that does not reach his eyes the way it once would have. Still, she’s lucky if she even _gets_ that hollow smile. His eyes usually flit elsewhere whenever she passes the glass wall of his new office and he avoids her altogether when he’s not there.

It gnaws at her only slightly because she knows she deserves much worse for breaking his heart. If nothing else, she’d just like the chance to apologize for her younger self’s decisions, most of all for getting him involved in the first place when she’d known that the life set out for her allowed no room for it.

Had it been so unforgivable that it’d called for a decade-long grudge, though? Of course, she hadn’t just been any old high school girlfriend to him; she knows that what they had had been too deep, too impossibly _real_ , to be reduced to a high school fling or a—

An incendiary new fear flairs within her, causing her hand to halt midway to her car’s ignition.

What if that’s _exactly_ what it’d meant to him? A stupid high school fling like the ones he’d had before they met. Had she been so deprived of affection that she’d viewed their year together as some grand teenage romance when he thinks they had just _fooled around_?

But the more she thinks it, sat frozen in her car in the dark parking deck, the less fathomable it seems.

Jon is honest, almost to a fault, and she’d seen an honest love in him that the men she’s been with since him cannot hold a candle to. There is simply no denying the countless moments that would be incomplete without the love she remembers radiating from him, from his bashful smile at seeing her chat with his mother to his attentive touch when she’d found herself in his bed. No, he’d loved her just the same as she had him.

It must be as simple as the notion that he has just moved on. He’d probably brooded and fumed for some time after that fateful call then picked himself right back up and now, their love is so far in the past that it’s too negligible to acknowledge.

For him to move on and find something— some _one_ better is what she’d wanted in the first place, right? So why is it so vexing when he keeps avoiding her?

~

Her feelings towards Jon Snow go from slight annoyance and hurt to barely repressed incredulity and anger.

Rumors, namely from the communications department, are beginning to spread that the new CBDO may just be out to take her job in the next few years.

It’s mentioned to her in a passing comment that oozes fake nonchalance by her Marketing Manager, Varys, as he drops off the November end-of-the-month reports.

At her look of perplexion, clearly from finding the remark and the fact it is said directly to her wildly absurd, he waves a hand and laughs a _very_ forced work-laugh. “It’s just silly gossip, Daenerys, don’t pay it any mind. You know how chatty the staff can get this time of year.”

His ‘reassurance’ is so thinly veiled that even _she_ , who mastered reflexive business charm and bearing long ago, finds it difficult to laugh along.

Jon has been in New York for just over two months now and apparently, there’s already talk of him beating her out at some future annual Board election. The possibility must be blatantly obvious for them to be discussing it now when he is two tiers below her in the corporate pyramid.

Yes, he’s been quick to rise up the ranks so far but it cost her _years_ to put together this company — hell, it cost her a _life_ — so it’s harrowing to think that being replaced is even a possibility, no matter how distant. While there are a good few Board members she believes to be loyal to her and her vision, she fears a larger portion wouldn’t think twice about giving her the boot. Jon is promising, after all, something she hasn’t ever wanted, let alone tried, to forget.

She only allows herself a few minutes to think on it, if only because the mountain of paperwork on her desk will not clear itself, but she dwells on it all the same.

“Missandei?” she eventually says over the corded office phone connected to the line just outside. “Can you please come in here for a moment?”

Her assistant pushes through the heavy glass door just seconds later, notepad ready to jot down whatever she thinks her boss has to inform her. Of course, she senses it like she always does and sets down the notepad before taking a seat in the plush chair across the desk from Dany.

“Be honest with me… do you think I could ever lose this position?” Dany starts, not caring to mask her insecurities in front of her closest friend. “That one day, I’ll finally piss the Board off enough with my ‘ _radical ideas_ ’ or— or they’ll find someone they think is better-suited than me?” She’s nervously chewing on her lip, scanning Missandei’s face for any subtle shifts that may confirm her fears.

All she finds, however, is resolute, unwavering faith. She knows it holds even more gravity when Missandei reaches over to loosen Dany’s tightly intertwined fingers and addresses her by her full name, saying, “Daenerys. I can’t imagine a day when this company isn’t led by you. You’re the heart of this place and every employee here would say the same.”

 _Well, apparently not every_ , she thinks.

“They _love_ you because you are good and fair. You pay the goddamn interns more than some of these people have been paid as permanent employees at past jobs and you’re not _entirely_ some capitalist pig that sees them as just modes of production.”

That draws a weak laugh from her, one that she thanks Missandei for with a squeeze of her hands.

“Some of the Board members are _actual_ capitalist pigs, and each and every one of those crusty white men can choke if they think this company’s philanthropic efforts are ‘ _radical_.’ We’d all be out on 2nd Avenue with pitchforks and torches if they have the audacity to remove you and that is a promise.”

This time, Dany’s laugh is full and wholly genuine as she says, “I believe you.”

The dumb rumor is banished from her mind until after the particularly nasty Board meeting from which her newfound antipathy towards Jon stems.

To preface, her Board of Directors is quite a divided group.

When she’d first sought out to begin a business, freshly graduated from Stanford (summa cum laude and a year early… though not to brag), she’d been naive and unversed and more confident than she ought to have been.

Her father had recently passed, bringing her grief but also the freedom to abandon the path he’d laid out for her in the family business. Targaryen Industries is the leading producer of aerospace and military technology and her father had had hopes— no, _plans_ — of his children leading a sector of the company each, her overseeing the business part. Dany had dreaded having to play a part in the sickening cycle, perpetuating the military-industrial complex against everything she believed in, and at 22, she’d been given a way out.

Her first start-up had been a failure, a result of that naivety and exciting, new freedom. She’d wanted to do something _good_ for the world through a philanthropic corporation, playing the game to glean its rewards then give them away to aid change where it is needed. The e-commerce market had had easy entry but garnering stockholders to support it proved to be less simple and soon enough, her plans had gone up in flames.

Her father used to say that her stubbornness would be her downfall and yet it’d been what pushed her to begin again, this time versed enough to know that breathing life into hopes as ambitious as hers could not be done through entirely pure means. She’d found new investors in contacts of her father’s and they’d then had a hand in assembling a new Board of Directors, leading to an odd mixture of truly good people attracted to the company’s philanthropic foundation and those only there for the monetary gains it promised.

That faction all but hates her to this day and puts little effort into concealing it. She is a woman so _naturally_ that means she only acquired her position through nepotism and flattery but her work is too impeccable, the corporation’s prosperity too great, to provide them with any reason to dispose of her.

The meeting that particular day had gone from bad to worse in a matter of minutes after a Board member suggested halving the percent of profits allocated for an anti-trafficking group she vehemently supports. It baffles her that she has to fight so hard to stay true the very purpose of this whole thing. So, it’s already with a sour mood that she collects her files and exits the conference room after everyone else has filed out, only to be met with an even more disturbing sight.

Jon Snow stands just a few paces away, _laughing_ about something with _Janos fucking Slynt_ , inarguably one of the worst cretins she has _ever_ had to deal with. If that hadn’t been off-putting enough, the fact that they immediately turn somber and change the subject to the fucking _weather_ the instant they notice her there sure does the trick.

While her face remains as impassive as carved stone, disbelief and rage churn within her.

With a robotic nod, she turns on her heel and leaves the two to collaborate as they wish. _What do I care?_

But the increasingly irritating truth is that she _does_ care and she can’t seem to stop. She cares enough that she _wants_ him to be on her side, _wants_ him to see things as she does. He owes her absolutely nothing but that doesn’t stop it from feeling like a betrayal.

Now it’s _she_ who evades him, more so out of anger at herself for feeling this way.

The third-floor visits lessen to almost zero. If she spots him across the floor, she maneuvers through the maze of cubicles in a path that is sure to avoid him. Should they ever meet in the hallways or the break rooms, she doesn’t even spare him a glance.

 _Now it’s_ your _turn to get over it, Dany_.

~

Their first words to one another that don’t have anything to do with financing or performance reports aren’t until the company Christmas party, three months after Dany had spotted him in that lobby.

She’s not even going to lie, she has had her eye on him for a while now but it’s hard not to when the crowd is thinning and he’s still there, looking like _that_.

She ought to have him fired on the spot for wearing a fucking _t-shirt_ with his dress pants and blazer instead of a proper suit but she knows Jon never did care much for dressing up. Besides, he looks too good for anyone to mind that he had the audacity to not wear a button-down.

His hair is free of the knot he ties it in now and she’s annoyed to learn that she still wants to run her hands through it just as badly as she had at seventeen. The warm, subdued lighting casts shadows on his face and caresses his angled features in a way that the harsh overhead white light in their office building could never, making him even prettier.

Of course, she’s not the only one to notice. Many of the women, even those who don wedding bands, titter and preen for him, hoping to catch his attention. She begins mentally compiling a list of employees to lay off, only half joking, but it becomes too long to keep up with it. They are less discreet than they think themselves to be as they fawn over his hair and his body and his voice and his demeanor and the faded but noticeable scar running from his brow to cheek.

She only learns of that last bit when Missandei mercifully pulls her away from some painfully forced mingling with Robbett Glover, another insufferable shareholder whose ass happens to be on the list of those she must kiss tonight to keep the place running.

“Some women from the logistics department have a bet going on what Jon’s scar is from,” Missandei giggles into her ear, just a bit too tipsy from all the champagne.

She can’t help but snort at that, perhaps slightly buzzed herself. “And what are their guesses? I’m assuming all heroic, cool things?”

Missandei nods, laughing as she realizes that probably isn’t the case.

“It’s from a _bird_ ,” Dany mock whispers, sending her friend into a fit of giggles and bringing a wide smile to her own lips, perhaps the first real one of the night. “He was attacked by a hawk in eighth grade and told people it was from a skateboarding accident.”

She almost feels bad for giving away his oh so precious secret but the feeling dissipates when she spots him clinking glasses with Meryn Trant, possibly the most shamelessly misogynistic asshat on her Board.

Dany makes her way over to the bar (open, of course) once Missandei informs her that there are still a few names left on her to-schmooze list. There’s simply no way she’ll survive the night completely sober and so she drains a whiskey highball or two before immersing herself into the crowd again.

The night commences as all past Christmas parties have: more exhausting than enjoyable.

This time of year has gone from her favorite, given it’d once forced her family to get along, to the most depressing. Her break up with Jon had been the first hack away at her love for the holidays and then there hadn’t really been a family to speak of, thus turning her into a regular Scrooge.

She struggles to maintain her winning smile as the hour grows late and people begin filing out but it’s her job as CEO to be courteous and stay until the end.

Once the only people left are those she’s already spoken to and she has all but shoved Missandei into her boyfriend’s arms to let him take her home, Dany returns to the bar. Ordering another highball, she takes up a swivel stool beside Tyrion, the only other person there.

At this point, it’s basically a tradition for her CFO to drink way more considered appropriate for a work event so she returns his lopsided, drunken grin with a shake of her head and smile of her own.

“Had a nice night?” he eventually asks.

“Oh, the very best,” she drawls.

He raises his scotch to that before motioning the bartender over and having her now-empty drink replaced with some concoction that he promises will wipe all memories of the night, telling her, “Let me make it a bit better. On me.”

“It’s an open bar, Tyrion.”

“You always have to ruin it, don’t you?”

Before she can banter back, his head turns at the sound of his assistant, Shae, making her way over.

Her dress is hardly appropriate for a night out, let alone a company Christmas party, and that’s clearly affecting the man beside her. The look in his eyes is so lustful and the fact that he’s just drunk enough to not care has her needing to stifle a laugh.

“I am reporting you to the HR as we speak,” she jokes but he barely pays her any mind as Shae makes it to the bar and leans in close to whispers something decidedly obscene to her boss. Before Dany knows it, they’re already departing, Tyrion flushing redder with each step towards the exit.

Dany orders another drink, her exact words to the bartender being, “Another one of whatever he told you to make me.” Sipping at it and welcoming the burn in her belly, she scans the few remaining people until her gaze lands on Jon again.

Perhaps the alcohol is catching up to her because she doesn’t know how long she looks at him before realizing his eyes are locked on her as well. It’s with a start that she notices he’s walking towards her now and she’s suddenly unsure what to do with herself. All too soon, he is too close for her to let him see her mild panic so she adopts a cool facade, resting one hand on the bar and the opposite elbow on the back of her stool with feigned grace.

From the moment he’d pushed through that revolving door in the lobby, Dany had imagined a thousand variations of how their first _real_ conversation would go, one devoid of any and all business talk. This had definitely not been in any of them:

“You look beautiful.”

He says it so sincerely, so warmly, she wants to splash her drink in his face and leap into his arms for a bruising kiss all at once.

She’s immediately rendered speechless, blinking several times and looking down at her simple black velvet dress before muttering an uncharacteristically sheepish, “Thank you.” It’s nothing special or overtly sexy, as it covers her from neck to mid-thigh with full sleeves and scalloped borders but she had chosen it for the way it hugged her body so well.

He drags his eyes from her to grab a glass of champagne from the tray left on the counter before leaning against the edge and facing out towards the hall. Still, she can feel his eyes on her and musters up the courage to meet them.

They give nothing away, that fact in itself taking her aback because she’s always been able to read them.

He’s the first to break away, eventually saying, “You worked the room like a pro, tonight.”

She takes a moment to silently celebrate her little victory before volleying, “I _am_ a pro.”

“Of course,” he says, the slight gleam in his eyes and the quick twitch of the corners of his lips making him look almost _proud_.

It leaves her head spinning, the torrent of contradicting signals quickly becoming too much. “What do you want, Jon?” she demands, sounding weaker than she would have liked.

The question snaps his eyes back towards her again, brows lowered in confusion that only infuriates her. “What?”

“You act like you don’t even _know_ me, like you _hate_ me, for three whole months and then come here looking at me like _that_ and I should just… go along with it?” God, she can hear her words begin to slur together but is helpless to stop it.

He just stares at her, mouth opening and closing several times before he decides on what he wants to say. “I never hated you, Dany.”

 _Dany._ The pang that resounds from her heart has her knocking back the rest of her drink.

“ _You_ were the one that ended things. That was what you wanted so I tried to respect it and kept myself away. Fuck, I should have quit the second I found out you founded all of this but they offered me this promotion to come down to New York which I didn’t even want and I—”

“Wait, what?” Three months of insecurities flash through her mind and she’s left feeling utterly stupid.

He waits for her to continue and it looks like he’s holding his breath in anticipation of what she will say.

“I— I thought… God, Jon….” And at this point, she feels entirely too drunk to be having this conversation but she can’t seem to stop the words from spilling out, some of them new to even her. “This company, what I do, it’s _all_ I have now and I thought everything was going to be snatched away from me because Varys is a dick and you hate me and the Board hates me and I have like three real friends and one of them is my fucking assistant so then I’ll actually have _nothing_ , just like Vis said and—”

“Woah, Dany, slow down,” he urges, acting like he’s all concerned about her as he takes the empty glass she’d been waving around and sets it on the counter before coming to sit beside her, rotating his chair so they face one another.

Some part of her mind marvels at the fact that this is even happening, that Jon Snow is once again sitting across from her and looking at her like he cares, but it’s drowned out as he begins to speak.

“First of all, the Board does not hate you. Barristan? Oberyn? Olenna? They fucking _love_ you, Dany.”

 _And could you?_ she almost asks, but even her alcohol addled brain knows that is a definite _no_.

“I don’t exactly know where the whole thing about me hating you falls here but you have to know that’s not true, Dany, right? I—” But what he does, she’ll never know because he snaps lips shut and pushes his hair back, a nervous tick she knows well.

“Then what were you doing with Slynt?” she implores, taking a sip of his champagne seeing as he’s failed to ask for a refill of the cocktail she’d finished.

“What? Today?”

Well that doesn’t improve matters.

“ _Oh_. The day of the November-end meeting. Are you seriously mad about that? He came up to me, Dany, what was I supposed to do? Say ‘fuck you’ to the guy that could have me fired at any little misstep? I was being polite, just like how you spent the entire night kissing up to every powerful person in this room.”

Her brain seems to short-circuit from relief or guilt or some other unnamable emotion because all she seems to be able to focus on now is the way he says her name, specifically her nickname, in almost every response. She likes to think it’s because he’s missed saying it just as much as she’s missed hearing it from him.

“Can we be friends, Jon?” she suddenly blurts, afraid of what else she’ll ask if she thinks about it, about _him_ , for too long.

He huffs, a wide smile transforming his face as he says, “Yeah. Yeah, alright.”

~

Unfortunately, Tyrion’s cocktails don’t do their job of allowing her to forget the night because come morning, she can painfully recall every second of that conversation with Jon.

What was she _thinking_ , blabbing to him like that? She hasn’t worked this hard or proved herself this many times to become some embarrassing, drunk, broken, little thing to him.

Just those few moments had made her realize she misses him — undeniably and irrevocably misses everything about him. But “ _Can we be friends?_ ” God, she must’ve sounded _pathetic_.

The weekend does nothing but provide way too much time to overthink so it’s with renewed zeal that she returns to work on Monday. She’d never perceived a time when she would be thankful for the mind-numbing amount of work that threatens to drown her each year during the last work week before Christmas.

Her morning flies by in a blur of conferences and annual report revisions and emails that she happily types out responses to until one particular email pops up in her inbox.

* * *

_**Jon Snow** <jsnow@thd.com>_

_to me_

_Good morning, Daenerys._

_As per our previous conversation, I would like to extend a luncheon invite to you for 1:00 PM today, Monday the 16th. Please let me know at your earliest convenience if this works for you. With your confirmation, we may begin discussing suitable establishments._

_Kind regards,_

_Jon Snow_

_Chief Business Development Officer_

_jsnow@thd.com_

_212-220-9099 Ext. 182_

* * *

The email is so ridiculously formal, she can’t help the laugh that bursts forth. The assurance that maybe she hasn’t scared him away just yet because he wants to smooth over their disagreements too makes her heart sing, along with finding out that his humor is still as dry as she remembers it.

She replies immediately, her response equally formal, and they decide on a Thai place a block away.

~

It surprises her how effortlessly they revert to the ease they once had between them, where the conversations flow naturally and even the silences are comfortable. It’s as if the past three months, even the past twelve years, are some unfortunate accident, swept aside without a thought to begin anew.

There are barely any new business deals being struck up at this time of year so her lunch blocks are always free. Very quickly, spending that hour together becomes a daily thing. Missandei wiggles her eyebrows knowingly each time Dany departs with a glowing smile and returns with an even brighter one.

The first few days are spent in a nostalgic haze as they pick restaurants simply to compare the food to what they’d had in their hometown. As they catch up, though, they are careful to skirt any subjects that may cause strife.

Jon had graduated from Boston University with almost a full ride (something she already knows because she’d been the one to read the award letter to him all those years back). He’d spent three years working at some miserable company that he decided to leave after the third year of barely any increase to his paycheck. He had then gone and applied to every other financial services corporation in greater Boston, one of them headed by Dany, a fact that he’d been ignorant to at the time.

She tells him her story of building all she has now, the failures and successes and everything in between and this time, there’s no doubting the pride in his gaze as it settles on her from across their little booth. Instead of being confused and enraged by it as she had been at the party, she relishes in it.

The day they discuss their families is a tense one.

Like Dany’s father, Jon’s mother had raised her children all alone but the two could not have been more dissimilar. she’d always admired Lyanna greatly, her easy nature so drastically different from anything she’d experienced with her family. Dany is glad to know that she’s doing well, as is little Arya who, according to Jon, is still just as little.

Her family, on the other hand, is more… complex. It’d been a point of contention for them back then but she refuses to let it be one now.

They’d always joked about how, if her father ever found out about them, he would murder the filthy lowlife leading his only daughter astray, and Dany had always laughed like it wasn’t exactly what he would do. So, Jon only knew her father from weepy late-night phone calls after a nasty fight or stories she would share at his prompting. He’d hated him and couldn’t fathom why Dany defended someone so controlling and manipulative and every other terrible adjective there is.

Still, when she tells him of her father’s death, Jon’s eyes hold nothing but sympathy.

“I’m sorry, Dany,” he says earnestly, head in his hands as his elbows rest on the bar counter before them. “For everything. I was such an _ass_ and I had no right to say all that stuff about him, about _you_.”

Not for the first time in the past week, Dany almost loses the fight against the urge to pull him close by his tie and kiss him till she can’t breathe.

She tries to tell him there is nothing to forgive, that _she_ ’s the one who should be apologizing because he hadn’t been entirely wrong. Nonetheless, he insists otherwise so she grants him her forgiveness, gently laying a hand over his as she does so. The touch seems to cause a ripple beneath her skin, resounding from her palm and raising goosebumps as it spreads.

Worried that it will somehow ruin this newfound friendship, Dany quickly pulls her hand away because she doesn’t think her heart would recover if he were to do so first.

With all the less cheery catching-up over and done with, their next lunch is thankfully on the lighter side.

It’s the last workday of the year and therefore their last lunch before the 10-day break as well. It’s also the first time he mentions her drunken confrontation from the Christmas party.

Having figured they’re just about done with work for the year, she’d lead him to a bar after rushing them through lunch. She had just finished ordering, thinking herself rather brave for getting a Long Island Iced Tea, when he blows a low whistle.

“And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“You sure about that drink?” he asks, rather condescendingly as he attempts to hide a smirk behind his dumb beer. “The party pretty much confirmed that you’re still a lightweight”

She scoffs indignantly, eyebrows furrowed as if her very character is under scrutiny. “I’ll have you know I was already five or six drinks in by the time you came up to me, Jon Snow! And I’m small!”

He only laughs, the real kind that reaches his eyes and makes them crinkle at the corners. “Sure,” he drawls before ducking to dodge a peanut she chucks at him. “I still can’t believe you thought I hated you. Yeah, I was pretty angry and confused after… the whole winter break thing but I grew up, Dany. And besides, how could I ever hate the mother of my child?”

It’s an old joke from their flour baby project, one that Dany had entirely forgotten until now. Inexplicably, a sense of contentment washes over her and she lets it, the fulfillment it brings comfortably familiar.

“I’m glad we spoke that night,” he eventually says, an earnest air descending over him as he leans closer and locks their eyes. The moment slips through her fingers, though, because he pushes away all too soon, exactly in the direction opposite to where she wants him. “At least now you have four friends instead of a three.”

And there it is: the one last lethal blow needed to not just end whatever it was that she’d just felt a whisper of, but demolish it.

_Friends. Right._

~

Christmas Eve brings an onslaught of melancholy that is too heart-rending to cure so Dany opts to drown it out with busy work instead.

Her two brothers are her only remaining family and yet she is estranged from one and a stranger to the other. Most of the time, she thinks her work and the lives it saves is enough but the holidays test her fulfillment. During a time when everyone else gets to forget about work to go be happy with their families, it doesn’t feel so good to have to do the exact opposite.

It’s with that thought that Dany makes her way from her office to the printing room two flights down. It’s odd to see the building so empty and dark with only the cleaning staff remaining as they finish up. They give her nods of greeting and some even flash her a pitiful smile, which obviously doesn’t help. Still, it’s better to spend Christmas Eve being productive here than nursing another glass of wine at home.

“Wow. I can’t believe you still have those.”

Dany jumps at the voice, almost dropping the warm papers in her hand. Upon turning to glare at the perpetrator, she really should not be as shocked as she is to find Jon. Who else would know about her favorite dragon pajama pants that she probably should’ve gotten rid of a decade ago? She’d worn them thinking no one would be at work but it’s just her luck that, of all people, _he_ ’s here.

He stands leaning against the doorway, arms crossed with a stupid grin on his face. His hair is still pulled back but in a sloppy loop at the back of his head with looser pieces here and there, not the neat bun he wears for work. The shirt, tie, and trousers are replaced by a BU hoodie and grey sweats that she tries not to ogle him through.

It takes her a moment to find her voice and even when she does, it sounds strained. “You scared the fuck out of me, Jon,” she says, meaning to rebuke him.

But his smiling eyes are still focused on her pants, warranting a shove from her.

“Of course I still have them. They were a gift.”

His eyes flash something intense before he blinks it away.

“What are you doing here anyway?” she asks, unsure of what to make of the brief look. “You said your mom and sister were coming down to spend Christmas with you.”

“They did, I just came by to pick up a charger I’d left here,” he says, patting his pocket. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

Before she can react, he grabs the stack paper she’d just printed. “It’s Christmas Eve and you’re spending it… filing the year’s audit reports?”

Her chest immediately tightens so she snatched the papers back and turns away to hole punch them, a feeble attempt at hiding anything her face may betray as she says, “I just wanted to finish this up. Missandei would have done it but she flew home last week and I didn’t want to forget so I thought I would—”

Her rambling is cut short mid-sentence as a hand grasps her shoulder and spins her around and full lips whose feel she has missed like nothing else are upon hers. She’s so lost in it, in the gentleness of his hands against the sides of her face and the disparate _hunger_ in the movement of his lips, that she doesn’t realize she isn’t kissing him back until he pulls away.

They’re so close that she can see the minute shifts in the muscles in his face as they stiffen and he initiates retreat. She grabs onto the neck of his hoodie before he can move too far and kisses him until her lungs burn before he can begin thinking something that isn’t true.

Her tongue brushes along his lower lip and he reacts eagerly, leaving her head spinning with only the taste of him to anchor her. She holds him close with her fists grasping at the front of his hoodie but he doesn’t seem keen on letting go either. One at of his hands is at her jaw to tilt her chin up for him and the other is on her back, firmly pressing her awakening body close. He kisses like sin and she can’t seem to get enough of it.

He kicks the door shut as they stumble backwards, both his hands slowly moving down her body all the while. They caress their way go down her back ‘til they reach her ass, giving a bold squeeze as they do. She can’t help but whimper against his mouth at the jolt of sensation.

He bends lower to get his arms under her, parting their lips until she ducks her head to reunite them. A muted squeal escapes her and she has to grasp his shoulders for purchase as he picks her up and sets her onto the flat top of the printer.

He pulls away then, only to move his lips to the spot just below her ear, right at her racing pulse, where he knows she likes being kissed.

Her rapid sighs turn to breathy moans as he mouths at her there and her fingers disappear into the curls at the nape of his neck.

It’s as bizarre as it is thrilling, doing _this_ with _him_ on top of a fucking _printer_ and knowing that she wouldn’t think twice about doing much more right here too.

He’s hugging her close with both arms under her shirt and wrapped around her waist but one slowly loosens to inch towards her front, his deft, knowing fingers caressing her rib cage as his thumb strokes the underside of her bra.

She brushes distracted kisses to the shell of his ear, the only part of him she can reach while he is no doubt sucking a bruise onto her neck.

It causes him to emit a low growl that she feels more than hears just before he recaptures her lips, his touch achingly light on her breast.

She can feel her panties have already more than dampened and entirely plans on doing something ab—

The printer makes a blaringly loud grinding noise, causing them both to jerk. Jon reflexively moves away and hauls her off the thing with him.

On her feet again, she looks from the terribly rude printer to Jon, finding the sight of his hair all disheveled, his lips kissed pink, and his dark, dark eyes impossibly arousing.

The printer suddenly begins clicking, making both their heads turn, and she can’t help the laugh that overwhelms her at the surreality of the situation and the fact that her ass might just have cost her a $1500 printer.

“You wanna get out of here before someone finds out we broke it?”

Dany doesn’t think she’s said “ _yes”_ to anything more eagerly in her life.

His car happens to be closer than hers but he must feel just as reluctant to part as she does, even if it is just for 10 minutes, because he opens the passenger seat door for her as soon as they reach it.

After two missed turns, she puts her address into his phone’s navigator because she’s too distracted by the fact that she can’t seem to keep herself off of him. She is determined to make up for twelve years of missed kisses by peppering them over his jaw and neck until he groans and says, “I’ll crash the damn thing if you keep doing that, Dany.”

Even still, his hand never leaves her thigh, so close to where she’ll have him soon that she squirms in anticipation, wiping the smug grin off his face with a nip at his earlobe.

It feels like hours before they finally pull up to her place, a modest little brownstone that’d cost her damn near two million. She leads him up the steps, one hand clutched in his and the other free to shakily unlock the door.

Once they step in, she notices his eyes seem to be searching for something as they glance over her living room.

“What?” she asks, suddenly insecure.

He just gives her a sad little smile before pulling her hands over his shoulder and letting go to rest his at her waist.

“It’s just that the Dany I knew loved Christmas so much that she would’ve had the whole place decked out from November 1st.” There is nothing unkind about his tone and so she softens instead of bristles.

“The Dany you know has changed a bit,” she whispers between them. “She doesn’t really have the best memories associated with Christmastime anymore.”

With a squeeze of her flesh, he says something she knows holds a promise of much more, extending far beyond the now: “Let’s make new ones, then.”


End file.
